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Until about two weeks ago, I'd been posting fairly regularly. Things were looking pretty routine, and I liked it. Yet, *CRASH*, here I am, posting about not posting... again.
I'd like to say life has been going on as normal, but for some reason, it's been on a downslope lately. I was having fun, killing bad guys in the game that Scott was running. The story shifted, though, and it was my turn to helm a game for a while. Since I wasn't going to just run a random module, I had to write it. I've always had this idea for an adventure based nominally on the poem by Alfred Noyes, "The Highwayman". Clearly, since the adventure is D&D at its core, it changes quite a bit from the narrative, but the initial story inspired me far more than it perhaps could have, had I not been an irrepressible nerd when it comes to fantasy.
Sadly, I cannot go into more details than that here, if only because far too many of my players can get to my journal here. I don't want them finding it, and I frankly don't feel like locking it, either.
I began hammering out details, but ran out of time for our June 1 game session. However, only Scott and Rick showed up. Somewhat disappointed, but glad for the reprieve (I now had another week to work on it), I ran a D&D Next playtest with them instead.
Over the next week, I began to assemble more parts of the story. I took breaks from creating the story to plot out how the weather would be in the game world for the next month of game time. I also reassembled my "RPG BGM" playlists, so I had proper music for the sessions. Needless to say, I was very happy with where the story was going...
...until I hit a snag regarding a potential encounter. Specifically, my imagination had a conflict with the mechanics of the game system I was using (Pathfinder, aka D&D 3.75). I'm sure I've run into similar problems in the past, but this time, I had a very particular idea for what I wanted and how I wanted it to work, and the game system was not cooperating.
That alone might not have wrecked things, because I can generally come up with some fun stuff on the fly. I would have likely figured out a band-aid cover for the issue, and moved on, had we played. However, only Scott and Rick showed up again. I had been so immersed in the creation of that story, that it didn't occur to me that it was the night of a big birthday bash for some friends of mine. I noted it, knew I wasn't going to be able to go because of my job and an early Saturday morning shift, and moved on. However, the other players (aside from Scott and Rick) either were going to that, or only knew me because of the people who were going to the party. To simplify matters, even though I ignored the party, others who could go didn't ignore it.
What hurt the most was actually that I found out around an hour after I was hoping people would show up. What made it hurt even worse was that I was excited to play this game. For the first time in nearly 10 years, I had written an adventure of my own, and was ready to run people through it. Yet, I was missing people. I became so prickly that I snapped at Rick for dozing off, when we hadn't tried to started before 8pm (he'd been there since around 6pm). I felt very let down. I know it's not fair of me, but I so desperately wanted to tell that story, and I was denied.
At any rate, rather than facing the story again, I have been "researching" alternative game systems that would do my story better justice. I think that enforced lack of writing took its toll. No, really. This is the little nugget of surprise for those who actually read this far, but lately, I've been feeling that writing -- creating with words, even if it's just a blog post -- is becoming a compulsion. Today, I actually had a fleeting glimpse that I won't always be a CSM for a grocery retailer. Instead, I'd be a writer. The sense of calm and happiness was tangible, even if it only lasted a split-second.
So, write I shall.
I'd like to say life has been going on as normal, but for some reason, it's been on a downslope lately. I was having fun, killing bad guys in the game that Scott was running. The story shifted, though, and it was my turn to helm a game for a while. Since I wasn't going to just run a random module, I had to write it. I've always had this idea for an adventure based nominally on the poem by Alfred Noyes, "The Highwayman". Clearly, since the adventure is D&D at its core, it changes quite a bit from the narrative, but the initial story inspired me far more than it perhaps could have, had I not been an irrepressible nerd when it comes to fantasy.
Sadly, I cannot go into more details than that here, if only because far too many of my players can get to my journal here. I don't want them finding it, and I frankly don't feel like locking it, either.
I began hammering out details, but ran out of time for our June 1 game session. However, only Scott and Rick showed up. Somewhat disappointed, but glad for the reprieve (I now had another week to work on it), I ran a D&D Next playtest with them instead.
Over the next week, I began to assemble more parts of the story. I took breaks from creating the story to plot out how the weather would be in the game world for the next month of game time. I also reassembled my "RPG BGM" playlists, so I had proper music for the sessions. Needless to say, I was very happy with where the story was going...
...until I hit a snag regarding a potential encounter. Specifically, my imagination had a conflict with the mechanics of the game system I was using (Pathfinder, aka D&D 3.75). I'm sure I've run into similar problems in the past, but this time, I had a very particular idea for what I wanted and how I wanted it to work, and the game system was not cooperating.
That alone might not have wrecked things, because I can generally come up with some fun stuff on the fly. I would have likely figured out a band-aid cover for the issue, and moved on, had we played. However, only Scott and Rick showed up again. I had been so immersed in the creation of that story, that it didn't occur to me that it was the night of a big birthday bash for some friends of mine. I noted it, knew I wasn't going to be able to go because of my job and an early Saturday morning shift, and moved on. However, the other players (aside from Scott and Rick) either were going to that, or only knew me because of the people who were going to the party. To simplify matters, even though I ignored the party, others who could go didn't ignore it.
What hurt the most was actually that I found out around an hour after I was hoping people would show up. What made it hurt even worse was that I was excited to play this game. For the first time in nearly 10 years, I had written an adventure of my own, and was ready to run people through it. Yet, I was missing people. I became so prickly that I snapped at Rick for dozing off, when we hadn't tried to started before 8pm (he'd been there since around 6pm). I felt very let down. I know it's not fair of me, but I so desperately wanted to tell that story, and I was denied.
At any rate, rather than facing the story again, I have been "researching" alternative game systems that would do my story better justice. I think that enforced lack of writing took its toll. No, really. This is the little nugget of surprise for those who actually read this far, but lately, I've been feeling that writing -- creating with words, even if it's just a blog post -- is becoming a compulsion. Today, I actually had a fleeting glimpse that I won't always be a CSM for a grocery retailer. Instead, I'd be a writer. The sense of calm and happiness was tangible, even if it only lasted a split-second.
So, write I shall.
